


If I kneel at your feet (will you give me what I want?)

by InnocentCurruption (OnyxStitches)



Category: Young Justice (Cartoon)
Genre: F/M, Magic, Possibly Dubious Consent, Ritual Sex, Rituals, because of bargaining, sex used as a bargaining chip
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-24
Updated: 2016-11-24
Packaged: 2018-09-01 21:10:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,003
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8638168
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OnyxStitches/pseuds/InnocentCurruption
Summary: Zatanna is left with one last chance to save Wally West after his disappearance in the reach invasion. To bad it involves barging with a certain lord of chaos.





	

Zatanna came to Klarion in the dead of night. Her hair was a mess and her eyes resembled nothing more then hell portals in the flesh; full of desperation and driving hunger. They bore into him with sharp intensity. There was nothing but defeat in the slump of her shoulders, and for a moment he reveled in the victory that their meeting represented for him. It was clear that in this meeting he would have the upperhand for once.

She had tried all she possibly could to bring back the fallen member of her former team but still she had failed. There were no more spells or tricks she could try in her self imposed quest. They both knew that he was her final option.

“Klarion.” She spat his name like it was bile on her tongue. “I require your aid witch boy. Can a deal be struck?”

He perked up at her formal words. They are remnants of a culture long gone where chaos and order were the way of the world openly and with few sceptics. Few have spoken them to him in centuries. He knew that her carefully chosen words meant she had put lots of study and thought into this confrontation. It's a thought that delights him.

He stroked Teekl and smiled at Zatanna with all his teeth on display. “Hello baby mage. How nice of you to visit. Still having trouble summoning back your lost companion?” The bared teeth are very much a threat display, and a habit he’s picked up from Teekl. “Ran himself right out of existence from what I heard. I suppose that means you need some help?” He cackled, and they both knew the bargaining has already begun.

“What can I offer to you?” Zatanna asks. “Surely you have something you need assistance with?”

A simple gesture of Klarion’s hand summoned a table and chairs between them. The look he shot her is practically an order to sit down. She did so promptly, far too wary of angering her host in his place of power to argue at the dismissive rudeness of the act.

“If that doesn’t suit you then I do have possession of all of Father’s library. There may be something in there you want.” She promised him. “Lots of the books are old and rare. Plenty are from before the book burnings and are hard to find nowadays.”

Klarion simply chuckled and shook his head in response. “You’ll have to do better than that little sorceress. A lord of chaos has no need for whatever books of baby magic your do gooder family has happened upon over the ages.” He scratched Teekl beneath the chin until she purred in response.

“Then what do you want?” Zatanna snapped; her temper finally getting the better of her control. “What price is worth Kid Flash’s safe return? Tell me!”

He’s half tempted to throw the rude mortal into the nearest volcano or something. Instead he breathed deep and reminded himself why her coming to him for aid like this was such a good thing. She may not be exactly what he had in mind for his current project but she’ll do. Sure she’s a little stronger willed on top of having a stronger mystic affinity than the practitioner he had planned on using, but he’s old enough to know how to roll with the changes in a plan. Now all he had to do is trap her.

Still his smile got a little sharper when he answered her. “As it stands I do have a little... task I might just require some helping hands with. What do you know of living foci?” Klarion’s head tilted slightly to the side as he spoke.

“A bit. Father brought them up once.” Zatanna admitted hesitantly. “What ritual could you possible be doing that requires a living channel for your magic other than yourself?”

Klarion waved vaguely around them. “Wards. You know how they are. Try to hide your lair in a pocket dimension and somehow wind up in Mexico.” He shrugged at that as if the info he’d just given her on his true magical strength wasn't ground breaking.

Zatanna hadn’t actually known he was strong enough to shift dimensions or take things across with him. Much less take an entire house into a pocket dimension and anchor it there. That sort of warding took skill, power, and a touch of divine luck to complete.

“No wonder you need a living focus.” She said breathlessly. “That’s dangerously volatile magic. A living foci would help stabilize it so the whole thing won't blow up in your face.”

Klarion nodded at that. “So you see how you can be of use to me. Now, is the bargain set?” He extended a hand to her. The whole movement was callos, confident. The witch boy was certain she’d agree.

“Why not use your familiar as the foci?” Zatanna asked rather than accept the offered hand. “You share a powerful spiritual bond with her.”

A look of disgust crossed over his face. His nose wrinkled and smirk twisted into a grimace as he shook his head. “The ritual I’m using requires a more physical bond between caster and foci. A human is necessary.” He covered Teekl’s ears as he spoke as if to protect her innocence.

Zatanna couldn’t suppress a wince because that little bit of info told her plenty about the kind of ritual and magic they’d be using for Klarion’s wards. Nine times out of ten when a ritual required a physical bond it was referring to something more than a bit of hand holding. Skyclad under her enemy was not what she had been planning on when she’d asked what she would have to do to get Wally back.

Still, this was all for Wally’s sake. Actually no, it was more for the sake of Nightwing and the team. Young Justice hadn’t really been the same since the speedster’s disappearance. She planned to fix that. Bringing Wally back would hopefully heal the rifts between teammates, or at least give them something of a boost to help transverse them.

If she was ever going to fix her friend’s emotional wounds then she was going to have to get far more up close and personal with her enemy than she had ever wanted to. And yet, considering all the times she’d almost lost her life on a mission, all the times she’d had to make a decision that had weighed heavy on her heart, and all the times she’d followed an order she didn’t morally agree with wasn’t this such a small sacrifice in the end?

“Are those the terms then?” Zatanna watched her conversation partner warily. “I be the foci you need to complete your warding and you aid me in every way you possibly can to retrieve my teammate.”

A wicked smirk lit Klarion’s face as he nodded to her. “You help me complete my wards, I get you back Kid Flash, and we both have what we want. Now those are terms I like. Is the bargain struck?” Once again he held his hand outstretched towards her.

This time she took it. The moment their skin touched Zatanna felt the bargain’s magic fall into place around them. Now, until their deal was completed, they were bound together.

“Wonderful!” Klarion said, having felt the magic settle in place. “Meet me back here on the next night of the dark moon for the casting ritual. Once the wards are set and my lair has shifted I’ll be able to summon your speedster from where, or when, he’s ran himself into. Those sorts of spells are easier in pocket dimensions anyways.”

He disappeared after that. Leaving Zatanna alone at the table to stare at his empty chair and ponder what she’d got herself into. The bargain was struck now and they both had no choice but to see it through or risk losing their magic. She didn’t lament or regret her decision. Instead she worries, and that was enough to keep her up all night.

* * *

Zatanna returned on the night of the new moon to find the abandoned house she and Klarion had met in was completely transformed inside. Gone was the rickety old interior. Instead she seemed to have walked into a stately manor fit for royalty. A quick glance out the door assured her the outside was as rundown as before, which made the internal changes all the more obvious.

Teekl met her at the door and led her down the maze of halls. Eventually, after she’s been led through enough twists and turns to feel dizzy, they wound up in a candle lit room with a huge ceremonial bath. It was less of a sunken tub and more of a large tiled depression in the floor. The slope of the walls were gentle enough on one side that someone could walk in and out of it, and several ceramic bowls of herbal mixtures waited beside it.

Klarion stepped out of the shadows a moment later. He nodded to her, surprisingly somber considering his normal extrebance. They both remained silent as he carefully poured a bowl of fragrant crushed herbs into the water. It was only after the perfume of monkshood, mugwort, aconite, and nightshade began to fill the room that he broke the silence.

“As the foci you need to be cleansed of all outside influence and have the warding runes etched on you in sanctified ink. So hop in the bath and then I’ll write runes all over you. If you’re up for it, that is.” He grinned.

She agreed quickly having expected such a thing was neccary from the moment she saw the baths. “I did consent to this. Let’s just get it over with.”

“Oh, cold.” Klarion commented, but he didn’t disagree.

Her clothes were stripped off with practiced ease. She folded them and set them several feet from the bath to avoid getting them wet if water splashed out. Then she turned back to face her companion and gestured to him. Part of her wanted to balk in shyness, but she stood strong. She’d done rituals skyclad before. There was no reason to be embarrassed.

Klarion striped out of his own cloths with ruthless efficiency and chucked them into a corner. He rolled his shoulders before taking her arm with a careful movement. Together they moved down the slope and into the pool.

The water swirled around them sensuously and slithered around Zatanna’s skin. It was the first time she’d been personally touched by Klarion’s magic outside of battle. The experience was an eyeopener for her.

Mesmeric tendrils of power slid against her skin and through the currents of the bath water. When Klarion’s hands settled on her Zatanna was almost blown away by the thrum of power his touch awakened. She shifted against him and heard his breath hiss out in shock. A part of her began mentally gibbering about magical resonance and highly compatible foci, but it was mainly background noise under the weight of their magic interacting.

Intellectually she knew what was going on between them. Their magic was highly compatible. They would work well together and their magic mixed perfectly. Joint spells cast with someone you resonated with were always more powerful than spells cast with someone less compatible. But it did have its drawbacks.

The more you mixed your magic with another highly compatible source the harder it got to separate it. The two spell casters might find their magic taking on the other’s traits. In some extreme cases the resonating parties had found their magic shifting so much that they eventually possessed identical magical signatures. They became impossible to tell apart mystically.

It could be considered the truest form of comment or the worst kind of identity loss, but either way it was a life changing event. Often it was considered too big a risk for compatible magic users to work together. Most resonating casters refused to work within the same hemisphere as each other.

Zatanna and Klarion could not be most people. Most people weren't bound by a deal they couldn't break. There was nothing she could do but slump against him and let the magic take her.

* * *

Klarion leant Zatanna back against his chest and began to wash her. He scooped more crushed herbs out of a bowl and lathered them across her skin with all the care of a person handling a porcelain doll. With iron focus he washed her from her head down to her toes as the magic thrummed between them with each touch. It rose up in an attempt to ensnare them both.

She writhed against him. Already caught up in the powerful resonance between them. He gave in with a groan and let the magic take him too.

His hands slid up to cup her breasts. They were covered in cleansing oils instead of soapy lather this time. A thrum of magic followed them and caused goosebumps to work over her skin. He brought his thumbs down to flick and her nipples, and they both moaned. Even more of the heady power was coursing through their connected skin.

It went through Zatanna’s veins like a solar flare; all consuming and impossible to stop.

His hands slid up, bringing the oils to her shoulders and collarbone. Then his touch withdrew for a second. A whine of disappointment slipped out before she could stop it

His hands settled back on her a moment later. They glided down her arms to her fingertips leaving trails of fresh oil drying on her flesh.

He covered her carefully. Gentle hands massaging oil into her scalp and back. They moved across her hips and thighs before Klarion started on her feet. Only once he was positive she’s been thoroughly anointed did he pull her out of the water and to the other side of the room.

She lay down on a black sheet. The magic pulling her into a trance like state and making soft colours bloom behind her eyelids. Lying back with her eyes still closed, she listened to the noise of another bowl being placed by her side. A quick glance over told her the bowl was full of shimmering ink. A brush waited beside it.

“Srewop fo redro dna soahc, Sa ew owt slessev od, emoc rehtegot.” The words whispered over Zatanna’s skin like the ink stained brush Klarion was drawing on her with. Each word and rune sparked even more magic into being. It was a thick and heady experience she wanted to never ever end.

Klarion continued to draw and chant. “Dna hguorht eht rewop thguoc neewteb,” His voice didn’t waver, seemingly immune to the flaring magic between them. “Dnes rou emoh ot a ecalp neesnu.”

Runes and chanting done, Klarion carefully lifted Zatanna up from the cloth. He pulled her forwards and out of the room.

Together they padded down the halls and into a library. The center of the room was currently filled with a pile of furs, and around those were the base runes of the warding spell. The inked runes on their skin shimmered in the lights as if reacting to the runes on the floor.

“I do apologize, Zatanna.” Klarion reached over and pulled the door open. Ushering her into the room with a sharp smile. “This probably isn’t the best place for such activities, but it is the center of the house. Where else could a warding like this be cast?”

It took Zatanna a moment to gather her thoughts enough to speak, which was enough time for them to settle onto the furs. “It’s fine. You’ve already set up the spell here. This is the center of the house, and wards should be cast at the centerpoint. Besides the magic feels really strong here.”

“I’m guessing from the way you are acting, baby magic, that you’re really caught up in it.” Klarion was shooting her an amused look as he spoke. “You’re not used to the feeling of chaos magic are you? This isn’t going to help then. Nekawa elcric fo rewop, dna dia rou lleps.”

A twelve pointed star burnt itself into the floor around the runes at Klarion’s words. The ritual was starting.

* * *

Klarion leant over her, straddling her with ease. Their bare skin was brushing, and the magic jumped between them like sparks. The feeling was causing Zatanna to arch against him as if a simple movement could slow the power wafting between them..

She could feel it as Klarion ran his careful fingers over her shoulders and down to her breasts. His narrow fingers sliding over pebbling skin and around slowly hardening nipples.

“Why...” Zatanna tossed her head back, moaning loudly. “Why are you doing this? It isn’t neccary for the spell.”

Her settled against her with a sigh. “It really isn’t neccary, you’re right. But I’m a lord of chaos not a monster. I want there to be no doubt in your mind that while you did this out of duty you still found pleasure in the act.” He nuzzled her breast. “Speaking of enjoyment, feel free to scream. I love that sound.” Wicked lights danced in his eyes.

She didn’t get a chance to ask what he’d meant by that, because all of a sudden he leant forwards and caught her breast in his mouth. It was like lightning on her skin flowing from his mouth through her skin to the molten core inside.  She’d never felt anything quite this good. Not even what she’d had with Nightwing.

Klarion swirled his tongue around her and laughed at her whimpers. “Not quite a scream but I’ll take it.”

“How are you so good at this?” She hissed. Pulling him close as her legs wrapped around his waist.

He brushed his cheek against Zatanna’s chest and smirked. “Never had another magic user in bed with you before?” He licked a burning stripe down her abdomen. “That’s our magic interacting, little mage. It’s stronger than usual because our cores are compatible. Isn’t it wonderful?”

He reached down and carefully unwrapped her legs from his hips. That done he slid downwards leaving a trail of scorching kisses in his wake.

Zatanna reached for him. Her hands trailed after his descent across her body. Success was found when her fingers slid home into the wild tufts of his hair. She tangled her fingers in his dark strands and pulled. Their eyes met. It was quite the sight. Him with his head cradled between her thighs and her twisting before him in pleasure.

Klarion slowly lowered his mouth to her mound. His eyes never left hers as he carefully nuzzled her. He cradled her hips with his hands and flicked his tongue over her. He was ever so careful with her as he sucked on her clit. Flicking aside the hood to play with the sensitive bundle of nerves beneath, and relishing in the harmonious moans she granted him.

“Please Klarion.” Zatanna tugged on his hair. It created a pleasurable friction as she pulled the dark strands. Eventually her fingers slid around the ‘horns’ and started using them like handles. She’d tug his head this way and that until he was sucking where she wanted.

He withdrew. It was a move that revealed the wicked smirk he was sporting. “What is it baby magic? Tell me what my little focus wants.”

“More.” She told him breathlessly.

He cackled before leaning down to lick her again. He could feel her shiver under him and it made him pull her closer. “I can give you that.”

He ducked back down, tongue diving back inside her, and moaned. Lapping her up and just watching her break apart under him was fulfilling so many of the fantasies he’d set aside as impossible ages ago. It made him feel so powerful to have her writhing beneath him, painted with his runes, and crying out his name.

He’d bet that her little boy wonder had never made her scream like that. Only a lord of chaos like him could have done this. It didn’t matter though. He’d gut the little bird before he could touch Zatanna again. Klarion had always known he was possessive. It didn’t shock him that he was so unwilling to let anyone else have his favorite enemy this way. And she was more than that now. Her magic perfectly matched his. How could he ever let her go now?

He hauled her hips up and smiled at her. It was a smile more filled with threats and promises than reassurances, but it was a smile nonetheless. Still, if she’d seen it the smile wouldn’t have reassured her. Zatanna was smart enough to have seen the restrained but violent victory in it. She’d have known to run fast and far if she’d caught him smiling like that.

But she hadn’t seen.

He slid back up her until his cock brushed her opening gently. “Sa owt emoceb eno etavita dna pils otni eht ecalp neewteb.” The magic filling the circle shivered as he spoke. He hesitated for a moment to give her time to relax.

“Tub wolla su ohw emaceb eno ot evael siht ecalp ta lliw.” Zatanna gasped out before bucking her hips and taking him in. The moment they were joined the spell began to seal itself. She knew then that she couldn’t stop. The magic was setting and the warding was almost complete. She wouldn’t have stopped even if she could though, because the clash of their powers felt so good. How could she ever give that up?

Instead they cried out and snapped together as surely as their magic had. For a moment they swayed together. They were caught in the hurricane of power swirling between them. The lord of chaos and a former vessel of order were, for a moment, trapped in the tempest of power mixing between them.

“Ah- oh.” Her eyes rolled up as she arched into him. “Klarion, please!”

Klarion thrust forwards. Wild and dazed from the feeling of just being in her. He was too lost in feral bliss to remember anything but the most feral rhythms.

Zatanna was just as lost as he was. She drove her hips back into his hard and took the pounding rhythm he’d set magnificently. Her nails left raw scratches down his back when she dragged them, and her legs wrapped around his back in a vice grip.

He moved to grip the furs beside her head, bracketing her body with his, and holding her in place as if worried she would leave. He had insured they were too tangled to separate.

“I’m going to come.” He warned her.

Zatanna nodded. “For the spell to work you can’t pull out.” She panted. “So I brought Plan B with me. It’s in my vest pocket.” She clawed down his back and laughed.

“You’re clearly better at planning then I am.” Klarion breathed out. Only to flinch a moment later as long nails were dug into his nape.

Zatanna was sporting a nasty smirk. “Come for me then.” She crooned.

Klarion groaned before leaning down and kissing her hard. They writhed together while the firelight glinted off their sweat. One of his hands slid between them as he did to rub against her clit.

She buckled under him at that with her head tossed back and her eyes nearly blind with pleasure. “Please...” she sobbed out. “Klarion please!”

He didn’t respond with words for once. Instead he bit hard at the spot where her shoulder met her neck and snarled into the pale flesh. He kept his teeth clamped tight to her skin even as she broke apart beneath him. Her hips undulating in a wild rhythm as she wailed.

He followed her over the edge mer seconds later. Drawn forcibly along by the clenching of her inner walls around him. He bit down hard enough to taste blood as Zatanna screamed to the heavens.

The rune markings he’d inked onto her earlier flared scarlet. At the same moment the magic around them finally reached it’s crescendo, and shattered. It’s purpose now completed with the rituals climax.

As the magic faded so did Zatanna. She was vaguely aware of sinking back into the nest of furs while gentle fingers checked her pulse. Then everything simply ghosted away.

* * *

The first thing Zatanna noticed when she woke up was that there was a warm body in bed beside her. Well, warm wasn’t really an accurate descriptor of them. No, the body snuggled up beside her was actually running at a temperature that in a normal person would make Zatanna quite concerned. She considered for a moment whether or not Klarion might be running a fever. He’d seemed quite cool the night before, but that might have been relative to the magic being used.

One sleepy eye cracked open for a moment to check on her bedmate. Both of them snapped open a moment later when she noted the red hair on the pillow beside her where there should have been blacker strands.

A very familiar freckled face lay on the pillow beside her.

“The summoning of him was really quite simple.” Klarion’s voice came from behind her; rolling over the room like mist. “So I just did the spell work while you were napping. You’re welcome.” His approaching footsteps thudded lightly on the carpet.

Zatanna twisted around in the bed to match gazes with the Lord of Chaos. “Thank you.” She said honestly. “Did your wards set right?”

“They did actually.”Klarion settled on the bed beside her and smirked. “Even with that little add on of yours. Mind you, if I were warding a strangers place I would add a clause that allows me to escape at any time too. Good thinking baby mage.” He laughed and patted her blanket covered hip.

A subtle shift of her legs under the covers informed Zatanna that her host hadn’t thought to supply bed cloths for her. “You promised to help me find Kid Flash. Nothing in that deal prevented you from backstabbing us once I had him.”

“True.” Klarion reached down and hefted Teekl up until she was settled on the covers. “So you’re now free to leave with your speedster. Your cloths are on the nightable. I would, however, advise dressing before making off with the redhead as the sleep spell I used will not survive a dimensional shift. You're a little marked up from last night.” The last sentence was said with a touch of masculine pride.

There was really no point in her trying to deny it. Zatanna had been awake long enough now for the throbbing ache to set in. She was sure there were plenty of scratches and marks across her skin.

Instead she slid out from under the covers and stretched. Each pop and crackle of a joint was heaven to her as she tested the damage done.

She walked past Klarion to the night table and picked up the bundle of her cloths. A casual flick of her wrist shook them out so she could put them on. All the while she ignored the dried fluids on her thighs and the hungry gaze on her back. She wasn’t going to let his attention throw her off no matter how unsettling it was to be gazed upon as if she were some infinitely valuable bobble.

A list of bruises was quietly forming in the back of her mind as she dressed. She had dark love bites across her thighs, chest, and neck. Her lips were still puffy and red. There were even fingerprints purpling over her hips as if Klarion had decided to take up finger painting with her as a canvas. A few scratches were interspersed where he’d forgotten to watch his nails.

The most obvious mark by far was also the only one her outfit failed to at least partially cover. It was a wicked and deep bite mark. Vivid and red, it sat right where her shoulder met her neck. It was clearly a human bite as well. The tooth impressions were too clear to be mistaken as anything else.

Zatanna smoothed down her cloths and sighed. No amount of expensive concealer was going to cover up that well enough to fool her teammates. She’d be lucky if it didn’t scar.

“I’m going now.” She warned Klarion.

The witch boy had watched her silently up until that moment. “Alright.” He said at last. “Take your speedster and go. Just remember that once you leave you can’t come back uninvited. Not that it’s any skin off my nose.”

Zatanna just strode forward and grasped Wally’s hand. She gazed down at where the boy was snoozing on the bed and smiled softly. A rather strong feeling told her that an invite wouldn’t be too hard to wrangle from the witch boy. Not if the way he was watching her was any indication.

“Ekat su emoh.” She intoned. Her magic swirled around Wally and her in a more chaotic swirl than she was used to. The portal worked just fine though, and they were left in her apartments living room. Even if the spell worked Zatanna still felt uneasy. Her magic just felt different to her. It was rippling about inside of her core more like a barely leashed hurricane rather than her usual gentle breeze.

She ripped her gloves off with a desperate hiss. The sunlight from the window glinted off her newly coloured nails.They were now as dark as night. She ignored the confused groan from her feet and carefully examined the new tint on her fingers. Before she’d left for Klarion’s abode they had been a deep gold. The new black represented a change in her magic she wasn’t ready to deal with.There was a reason most powerful magic users wore some form of hand coverings. Magic has a habit of effecting minor extremities like nails or hair. Order based magic tinted nails gold and kept hair in place. As a child she’d once joked with her father that her magic had made hairspray and nail polish obsolete.

Chaos magic rather notoriously left nails darkened and hair with a tendency to spring into disarray. His overuse of it was probably why Klarion’s hair stuck up the way it did.

Order was yellow, blue, or white. Chaos tended towards red, orange, or black. Brown and green were markers of the natural magic that shaped the world while grey or silver was truly neutral power. Death magic was supposedly purple although Zatanna had never met someone stupid enough to dabble in it. To a spell caster colour meant everything and the change of shades on her nails caused her breath to catch.

“‘Tanna” A confused voice drew the young sorceresses attention out of her daze. “What happened?” Wally asked.

She stared at her newly returned friend for a moment before sighing. “I don’t know.” She admitted with a heavy heart. “I just don’t understand.”

She pulled the gloves back on and forcibly pushed the panic to the back of her mind. “But I’ll tell you what we should do.” She grabbed her phone and held it up. “Call Dick.”

“Because He’ll know why I went from running in the snow to sleeping in your living room?” The phone didn’t seem to clarify anything to Wally.

Zatanna shook her head. “Because it’s been five months and her deserves to know his best friend is alive.” She hit a button in her contacts and grimly waited for her ex to pick up the line.

“Five months!” Wally hollard behind her. “What do you mean I’ve been gone five months? The invasion was a minute ago!”

A stuttering breath was drawn across the other side of the phone. “Zatanna,” Dick’s voice broke. “Was that Wally?” It wavered between hope and fear.

“Yeah, come grab you speedster.” She told him grimly. “He’s pretty confused and I’ve got some spell work to do. I need a quiet house.”

Dick hesitated at the tone of her voice. “Zatanna, what did you do?” He asked in a voice more fit for Nightwing than Dick Grayson. 

“I made a deal with a man who could match the devil, is what I did.” She admitted while looking Wally up and down grimly. “Wally looks fine, but I don’t know what sort of spellwork was used to summon him back. I was kind of unconscious at the time. We might want to check that Wally is really himself.”

Dick hummed low in his throat. “I’ll be there in ten. Leave the door unlocked and I’ll handle the rest.” Then he hung up.

Zatanna closed her eyes and held up a hand to forestall any questions Wally might ask. “I’m going to brew some coffee.” She told him. “I’ve used a lot of magic today and I need to be awake when Dick arrives.”

She wanted sleep, but there wasn’t enough time for that. Still she craved it. Maybe if she slept she’d stop feeling the prickles of Klarion’s magic running through her veins.

* * *

A week later found Zatanna sitting in a corner at the welcome back party the team had thrown together for Wally. Batman and J’onn had spent days poking and prodding him until the speedster was declared the real deal, and now it was time to celebrate his return.

“I just wanted to thank you for bringing him back.” The Flash told her; having appeared at her side just a second ago. “You didn’t have to risk your life to save him, but you did. So just thank you. For having Wally back thank you.”

Zatanna stared down at her glove covered hands and gave a humorless smile. She took a moment to be thankful that Doctor Fate hadn’t been invited. Then she took another to be glad, for the first time ever, that her father couldn’t see her this way. 

She could just imagine the horror her father would feel at seeing what his little girl had become, how hopelessly corrupted her magic was now. The rage of Doctor Fate when the lord of order realized she was now his enemy, and the betrayal her friends were sure to feel when they found out she went to Klarion for help were on her mind as well.

She could remember her mother just before her death and the warning she’d given. “All magic has a cost.” Zatanna had been warned. For her mother that cost was her life. For herself it was her magical inclination. From order to chaos her core has shifted internally. Such a tiny change to rock her whole world.

She lifted her eyes, squared her shoulders, and met Barry’s gaze head on. “It was worth it.” She assured him. “I’m glad he’s back.”

“We all are.” He smiled.

She fingered the glamoured bite mark on her neck and thought back on how transparent her hair had appeared this morning.

“Hey Flash,” she gazed up at him. “You wouldn’t happen to know any good animal shelters around here, would you? My apartment's been feeling rather lonely lately.”

Barry lit up with excitement. “Yeah, I do! We could go tomorrow, maybe take Wally and Bart with us. We could make a day of it? Iris wants you to come over for dinner as thanks.” He rambled off just slow enough to be understood.

“Sure, I’d like that.” She laughed and the tension eased off of her shoulders. “I’ve heard wonders of Allen family dinners.”

Barry zipped to her other side. “It’s a deal then! What kind of pet were you thinking off anyways?”

A rather wicked smile split Zatanna’s face. The chaos under her skin bristled and writhed like a living thing, and the feeling brought up the memory of an arching orange feline.

“Well, I’ve been wondering...” She leant back and smirked at him. “Do you know any dog breeds that are particularly cat friendly?”

**Author's Note:**

> Backwards spells:  
> When Klarion is writing runes all over Zatanna he says “powers of order and chaos, as we two vessels do, come together.” and then “and through the power caught between, send our home to a place unseen.”  
> When they start the ritual the words he uses to summon the twelve pointed star are “awaken circle of power and aid our spell.”  
> When they finish up the spell Klarion says “as two become one activate and slip into the place between.” Zatanna then says “but allow us who became one to leave this place at will.” adding to the spell and preventing Klarion from ever trapping her in this pocket dimension.  
> The spell Zatanna uses to return home just means “take us home.”


End file.
